


The Witcher Kyril

by MZMpac



Series: The Witcher Kyril [1]
Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Bear School - Freeform, Post-The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, The Witcher Lore, Witcher Contracts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-21
Updated: 2019-02-21
Packaged: 2019-11-01 22:30:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17876060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MZMpac/pseuds/MZMpac
Summary: The Witcher Kyril is a series of non-linear shorts and vignettes about the life and times of Kyril, a witcher of the resurrected Bear School living after Geralt’s time. The events take place circa 1325-1350 BR; or between 50-75 years after the events of the Witcher 3.While built on witcher lore, this is NOT a continuation of canon storylines.I always found witchers the most fascinating part of Sapkowski’s world, and was often disappointed how little attention he paid to witchers and how much he paid to Ciri! This is a collection of tales that allow me to scratch a creative itch exploring the creation, code, and daily life of these enigmatic monster hunters. I hope you have fun reading them :)





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This is a fictional work set in The Witcher universe, and reasonable efforts have been made to keep the lore consistent with existing canon. No single medium is held to exclusively, and elements are used from the both the books and the games. That said, there may be occasional inconsistencies, and I do take creative license at times to fill in the gaps in witcher lore, while still trying to keep in tune with the feel of our beloved Witcher world.

“Witcher Kyril? Aye, I know ‘im. Boss paid him to do a job two winters back. His rates were bloody high but said he'd pay him again in a heartbeat, should the need arise. That man was a right professional, he was. He brought me back the head of that foul beast in a jar, preserved in brine, within 24 hours. Truly not something I needed to see nor will ever forget, gods, but it was proof of a job done. Quiet as they come, he was, but polite. He asked me all sorts of questions, talked to me wife, the Alderman, who near shit his pants when he saw ‘im.

"Why, you ask? Well, most of us have never seen a witcher around these parts. Tell you the truth we thought them a relic. He looked a bit frightful, indeed. I’d call him pale, with eyes like a viper, blue as a frozen lake. Scars on his face, neck. Tall, I suppose, but no giant. I imagine he’d be a lord of some sort in another life, handsome even if it weren't for his profession. He wore studded black leather and a wool cloak, with some silver pendant 'round his neck. Looked like a bear but I couldn't be certain. And two swords, by the gods, just like the tales. 

Left as quick as he came, he did. I offered him a bed for the evening but he just shook my hand and said he had to be going. He had a young boy with him, a ward he says. Strange fellow, indeed. “

\---------------------

“Yes I’ve seen that man. How could I forget? Baron Meldman hired him to remove the wight from the cellars last spring. He questioned me on what i had seen. I had seen a witcher before, when I was a girl, but he looked much different. This man...what did you say his name was? Kyril, he, well I’ve never seen anyone like him. He nearly made my heart stop the way he stole into the hall, quiet as a cat. The Baron never told me a witcher was coming, much less that he would want to question me.” The woman paused, swallowed.

“What did he look like...well, he was handsome and ghastly at the same time, if you could believe it” she said in a quiet tone. “He was tall, dressed in black leather armor, broad at the shoulder and wore a wool cloak. He had a steely look about him, but was surprisingly polite, eloquent even. I’m not sure what you’re supposed to expect of a witcher but it was almost as if he had another profession in a past life, the way he spoke. Like a physician, he reminded me. And his eyes"…the woman shook her head absently and glazed over. “His eyes, the palest blue you’d ever seen, but like a cat. I know witchers all have those mutant eyes but they were a sight to behold, especially for a lady of court, you understand sir. He had dark hair with grey at the temples, and hadn't shaven in a week I’d guess. He smelled of pine, horse, and sweat. Not offensive, mind you. He just didnt strike me as the kind who sleeps in feather beds.”

“After the job the Baron offered him stay for the week, as foul weather was coming. He did oblige a meal with the Baron, but that was in private with him and his lady wife. The next morning he rode into the fog at dawn. “

\--------------------------------

“What is it you wish to know about him? Oh, a book. I see. Well you seem the scholarly fellow” said the banker, looking over his glasses. “Yes I know him, have since I was a lad. He spent a summer on my father’s estate when I was but twelve summers or so. He was a witcher at that time, and came to us gravely wounded. He knew my father would help, and he did. If I remember he was slashed through the neck and chest by some foul beast, and nearly bled to death. Father said if he weren't a witcher he would have died within minutes from that wound. But he recovered quickly, as witchers do. Within a week he was up and helping my father bale hay, tend cattle. Strong he was, I remember. Especially for a man just wounded. Lifted two bales at once like they were gunny sacks of potatoes. You know he wasn't always a witcher, right? Yes, indeed. Don't look at me like that, I’m no scholar but not a dunce. I remember well, and my father was especially fond of him. They went to medical school together as lads. That’s right. Evidently it’s quite unusual for a witcher to be trained at that age, but he was. Father told me that his mother was killed by some monster while he was at Oxenfurt. A savage murder, I’m afraid. He hired a witcher himself to kill this beast, as it was no ordinary beast. Even most witchers wouldn't take contracts on them. So he found a professional who would do it, but it came at a steep price. In exchange for killing the beast he wanted to take Kyril as a ward. Their order needed a physician to help regulate their mutation process as I recall. He accepted, and the way father told it, Kyril refused to test his new methods on boys. So he did it on himself. And survived, by the skin of his teeth. Being a mutant there forth and for his service to their order, they decided to make a rare and notable exception to their code and train an adult. He wanted it, I believe. I think the death of his mother deeply wounded him, and he felt it a calling.”

“At the time he stayed with us my father was over forty summers, and had been a physician for some twenty years already. That would make Kyril the same age at that time, but he didnt look it. He had a fearsome look about him yes, with his scars and witcher eyes. But aside from the toll of his profession he looked every bit a man of 30. “

“At any rate… what’s that? Yes...oh yes, i have seen him recently, last Samhain as a matter of fact. He was passing through on some business. He looked well. A few new scars, heh, but well. Hardly aged, it’s a surreal thing to see.” The man sighed, paused for a long time. “He’s ultimately a good man, Kyril. I believe his heart to be good. But witchers are killers, remember that,” The old banker removed his spectacles and locked in with grave eyes. “His complex reputation is not a wive’s tale. So take heed if you do end up finding him.“


	2. The Green Man

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kyril takes a contract on a forest monster while en route to Geso.

“What are you doing!” Kyril barked at the boy. 

The boy, wide-eyed, displayed a gash on his palm that looked like fish gills.

“Idiot.” he hissed. “What made you think that was a good idea? I told you never to touch those swords.”

Kyril’s silver sword lay unsheathed near the campfire. He had left them unattended when he stepped outside camp for a moment to relieve himself. I should have known better, he thought. What boy can resist touching a sword like that. He glowered at the boy, who held his bleeding hand and looked like he would perhaps trade the hand itself to take back what he had done.

“Show me. Here. Open your hand….now close it. Spread your fingers apart. Now pinch.” The boy winced but did not cry. 

“Sit, boy” he said with a sigh. “Your wound will need closure.” 

He had admonished his companion never to touch his swords for good reason---both were enchanted, and sharp as a barber’s razor. He liked to embellish the enchantments to nurture the myth that all witcher swords were magical; saying they would render a man sterile, or impotent, or paralyze the holder’s extremity with a nerve toxin. In truth, he had both of his blades modified by a runewright he met in Zerrikania, but they only posed danger to quarry, not the user. 

He pulled a small pouch out of his saddlebags, along with two vials. The wound was cleaned with a linen cloth and tincture of iodine, then closed using dissolvable catgut suture and a horizontal mattress technique. Kyril knew a field surgeon based out of Oxenfurt he would resupply from when passing through. He seldom had to sew his own wounds anymore; but it paid to be prepared. His own wounds healed in a quarter of the time of a normal man’s, and the suture dissolved likewise, saving the hassle of plucking them out.

He put a dab of citrulline mold salve on the wound, wrapped the boy’s hand in a linen roll and pulled out another vial out of his bag. “Open your mouth, stick out your tongue”. The boy looked at him, hesitant, but did as he asked. Three milk-white drops fell from a dropper, which conferred a rather pleasant taste. “Tincture of poppy”, he said. “You’ll sleep like a stone tonight.”

The two gazed at the campfire for a time in silence.

“You understand now why are you never to touch my swords.” He wasnt asking, but the boy nodded the same. “These are dangerous weapons, made for fast killing.” He unsheathed a blade halfway, the boy’s eyes fixated on the archaic runes engraved into the fuller. He clasped the boy’s nape. “You couldn't help yourself, lad. Let’s let bygones be bygones.”

***

The next morning the duo set off at dawn to Hadleigh. Kyril’s intent was to resupply there and set off again before noon, but that would leave him with little coin for the remainder of the journey. In fair weather, with no obstacles, it was at best twelve days to Dun Murra. So sixteen, in all likelihood. He would have to find work. 

He disliked the hand-to-mouth lifestyle of the typical witcher, and preferred instead to take a run of contracts over one to two weeks, then deposit the lump sum-- should local rates be favorable--returning to withdraw and deposit new earnings after his next run of work. This leapfrog method had served him well so long as work was available, which of late had only increased. 

“Master Kyril, where did you learn to be a witcher?”

The boy had grown more talkative over the preceding week, and Kyril for the most part obliged his curiosities. It was a welcome change.

“I was trained in Skellige.”

“Skellige...do they train all witchers there?”

“There’s another school in Kovir, and I’ve heard of one in Korath. Centuries ago there used to be many witcher schools, but they’re all gone.“

“How come?”

“Well, monsters became less and less of a problem in the world. Over time, as civilization grew and consolidated, it pushed the creatures that once plagued humanity out into the wilds. They dwindled in numbers, and harmed fewer people. The empire of Nilfgaard expanded, and for a time there was great persecution of mages, sorceresses, and all users of magic. Our schools fell into decline, and the witcher trade slowly died.“

The boy fidgeted in his saddle. “Why would anyone hate you? Because they’re scared of your magic?”

“Scared, and distrustful. When people dont understand something they either run from it, or become angry and try to drive it away. Sometimes even kill it.” 

The boy was pensive for a time, and their horses ambled on in leisure. The day was balmy and the spring green vibrant.

“Are there more witchers like you?”

“There are. Not many, but more than there have been in a long time.”

“Do they work as knights and escorts like you?”

“Well, this isn't a typical job for a witcher. We still hunt monsters, just like we always have.”

“Can I go with you on a hunt?”

“No.”

“Why no--”

“Out of the question. No.”

“I’d be real quiet, sir, like--”

Kyril silenced him with a glare. 

***

 

Hadleigh was a town at the western edge of Geso with an Inn, two windmills, and a neat patchwork of pear and apple orchards. Idyllic, thought Kyril. A gem, even.

They reined their horses towards the inn. The inn stood adjacent to a large barn, recently tarred, and a neat backdrop of alders. It had a covered porch, with tables and brightly painted folk totems carved from tree trunks. A man, sun-weathered and covered in wood chips sat at a table with an ale. 

“Greetins’ master witcher. You’ll forgive my presumption but I daresay you’re not the local tax collector, heh!” He spat, his lower lip stuffed with tobacco. “Greetings good man. And here I’d hoped to blend in with the populace. Are you in need of a witcher?” 

“Jus’ so happens I am. A fortuitous day, it is! Felled two ash afore noon, got the lads started on planin’, and just sat down for vittles and here comes a stately witcher, with a lad of his own no less. Come, have an ale if you have the time sir.”

The duo joined the woodsman on the porch, listening to his quandary over roast mutton with potatoes and dill. The inn keep and his pert serving wench in particular kept stealing glances at Kyril through the warped glass of the windows. 

“Sounds like a Spriggan”, said Kyril. “You’ve been logging in its territory, unbeknownst to you. They aren't as malicious as Leshen, but will attack when threatened.”

“Oy, a Spriggun…my nan used to tell a tale of a Spriggun, but I never seen one, not in my twenty-odd summers of logging. I thought them a faery tale if I’m honest; although once I did see a Leshen I believe, if only in passing. Scared the piss out of me it did. A great tree with an elk skull for a head, walking about as a man. For only a few seconds I saw ‘im, maybe a furlong off near Glen Gessig. Gods, no one believed me either, but I later met a witcher who confirmed I wasn't a loon!”

“Spriggans are relatives of Leshens, but less predatory and seldom seen. Who else do you think has seen it?”

“The Alderman, for one, as he was in camp that day in my stead. Believe his daughter was also there, but she’s a bit of a loon herself, might not get far asking her. My wife claims she seent it the day before, I can take you to her if you like. The other two lads are dead and buried, I’m afraid. We had to cut their bodies out of them limbs with an axe. A gruesome sight, tell you the truth. Their chests were crushed and eyes poppin’ out their head like radishes. My men were scared shitless the whole time. We cleared out of there and haven't returned since. I cant even get them to log within half a league of that ash grove.”

“Shame, it would have been helpful if I could see the bodies. Where can I find this Alderman?”

“Alderman Jeorl, he can be found in the third pear orchard, just north of here. You can square up your fee with him, him being my employer.” The duo left heir coin at the table as the serving girl gawked from the door frame.

“You think you’ll kill it, master witcher? The Spriggun?”

“Depends. They tend to be peaceable creatures, so I prefer not to when other means of placating them are available.”

The logger scoffed and spat a mouthful of tobacco juice.

“Peaceable, eh? Tell that to 'dem boys and their mums.”

***  
Alderman Jeorl was a squat man with beady eyes who haggled Kyril up and down. Kyril had little patience for misers when it came to his work. He was performing a professional service that required considerable preparation, and was not without the risk of death and dismemberment. Since he hadn't the benefit of an insurer, his rates were, by and large, non-negotiable. Most paid the fee, reluctant at times, but the demand for witchers on the fringes of the civilized empire exceeded the supply.

“Seventy five and not a copper more”, said the alderman, fat arms crossing his chest. 

“I’m not your local farrier, sir. This is a dangerous being that killed two of your villagers. If you want the problem solved, and solved for good, you’ll pay me a retainer of 150 and a balance of 150 upon completion. Quite frankly, I’m giving you a deal. Or you can hire another witcher.”

The alderman spat, and sneered. 

“Oh pox on the lot of you, for fuck’s sake. Why don't you just ask for my firstborn? Do we look like fancy folk to you? Like we’re hoarding crowns out here on the edge of society, minin’ gold underneath our pretty orchards? Fucking ‘ell.”

The witcher was stony. The alderman didn't like his eyes, inscrutable and alien. 

“Fine, gods. Margery!!! Bring me my coffers!!”

As the Alderman’s wife, a portly woman with ruddy cheeks, doled out his coin, she noted his companion. 

“Is he your son, master witcher?”

“No. He’s my ward for the time being.”

“Adorable boy. Do you means to take him with you on your hunt? Seems a dreadful thing for a child...I could watch ‘im for you if you’d like. Got three of my own, over there.” She motioned to two young boys and girl struggling to pull a laden cart between rows of pear trees. “We’ll feed him right, maybe even give the poor lad a bath.”

He regarded her for a long moment.

“I suppose you’re right madam, and kind of you to ask. Would you mind? I’ll be gone a day, maybe two at most. You can take twenty-five off the balance”

“Absolutely dear,” her kind eyes sparkled. “‘Das no trouble at all. Come now child, are you hungry? Do you like jam? We’ve a wondrous pear jam and I just baked a loaf of bread.” He nodded and smiled sheepishly. “What’s you name child?”

“Jasen.”

“And what of his kin?” she said, speaking to the witcher but looking at the boy, stroking his hair. “His mum and da’?”

“He’s an orphan”, Kyril lied. “I'm taking him to the south, where he has relatives.”

“I see. We’ll come now boy, come.”

“I’ll see to him proper, master witcher. I trust we’ll see you on the ‘morrow?” 

With a look as if she expects me to leave him, he thought, and nodded. 

***

Spriggans and Leshen were not common contracts. Semi-sentient and ancient, mediating with them was not an option, and negotiations with the local populace about avoidance and trigger behaviors was seldom effective. By them time a contract was posted, one or more people had been killed, animals slain, or property damaged. 

Baiting and ambushes were the preferred method, but often involved long hours or even days of surveillance and monotony; staples of the trade. 

He rode to the glen where the attacks occurred, finding an unnatural mess of gnarled roots, hacked with axes, freshly turned earth, and week-old blood. Leshens could be easily lured by destroying their cryptic totems; made up of animal skulls, stones, arcane symbols, human artifacts or even human remains. Spriggans, on the other hand, were an obscure lot with few discernible patterns in behavior. Kyril brought with him a felling ax from the logger he met in town, and got to work. 

He felled several trees in a random pattern, small and medium to avoid unnecessary labor, and chose to post up in a small dell to wait, and prepare. He made a fire, and with a small mortar and pestle pulverized hop umbels, green mold, alchemy paste, and a handful of other ingredients he kept in a large satchel. The mortar he then laid in the coals of the fire until the mixture reduced. To the resultant paste he applied a small vial of relict oil he had previously made, and the new mixture was then strained through cheesecloth onto his silver blade. He laid the sheathed blade in front of him, knelt, and waited. 

***   
Hours had passed and it was now after midnight, moonlight filtering through the ash glades in opaque beams. Kyril meditated for a time, slept in the twilight state a witcher learns, and ate. Nothing. He ate again, wrote a letter to the Baron of Eastwick and his wife whom he planned to visit in the fall, and waited. Still nothing. 

He decided to get up and fell a few more trees. Within two stokes he heard a commotion; like the sound of a distant tree falling in the woods, rising back up, and falling again. He froze and listened. The sound grew closer. As he drew his sword he felt a tickle at his boot, a tug. Before he looked down a tickle at his belt, then his neck. At once he swung around and freed himself of the fingerling vines that had crept up from the earth; snapping them and hacking their green flesh with ease. Before he could finish another slithered up his leg, then another, and yet another crossed his chest. Bigger than the others, they squeezed like a python and pinned his sword arm to his side. He felt a twinge of panic set in. The great falling and rising tree was now within a hundred yards. With his sword arm trapped he couldn't hack, and another vine trapped his steel sword against his back. As soon as he freed himself from one vine another three took hold; creeping up his trousers and under his armor and into his hair. They pulled him into an alder and squeezed in unison, a terrible contraction of rooty stalks and appendages working faster than he could breathe. He wrenched and writhed and swore with fury, breaking the smaller roots but empowering the biggest. Just as his silver sword was wrested from his hand his heart sunk at the sight; a gnarled oaken tree as tall as 3 men, ambulating toward him with great strides and a terrible protracted groan. It had a face in the image of a man, an old and decrepit man with shelf fungi growing from its visage and a tangled crown of rotten moss, surrounded by a halo of bees, wasps, and all manner of stinging insects. 

A Spriggan. And a massive one at that. 

Kyril cast Yrden as best he could with his free hand, hoping to quell the possessed mass of roots. The cast was weak and deflected into the ground, useless. His panic began to increase, no longer able to arrest his heart rate, when a small missile hissed through the air and struck the beast in the neck. An arrow, fletched with quail feather. 

Jasen.

Kyril swung his head around to see the boy and his recurve bow on a small hillock, notching a new arrow and sticking his tongue out in concentration. 

The Spriggan recoiled at the strike, and at once the roots binding the witcher loosened, as if an appendage of its trunk. Another arrow struck its leg, and the creature now turned it’s full attention to the boy. 

“Jasen!! Run!! It will kill you!” Kyril cursed a foul string, at this forest sentinel that was getting the better of him and at his own stupidity for not trying to lure it into a clearing. He wrestled his sword arm free with a violent motion, drew the hunting knife from his belt and began to hack and slash away at the roots enveloping him. The boy fired another arrow and missed as the great Spriggan lumbered his way in haste. It let out an awful, deafening groan as the boy ran in a futile and panicked effort to out pace it. Kyril, now free, angry, and armed bounded over fallen trees to exact his vengeance.

He pulled a small ceramic cylinder from his belt--that by some miracle hadn't been crushed--at the beast; exploding in cloud of green, iridescent dust on impact. The Spriggan recoiled and waved its great limbs in wild irritation, just as the witcher closed the gap and cast a full-strength Igni at its legs. Flames erupted around the woody limbs and moss curled up like burnt rope as it wailed in a deafening cry. Kyril sliced at its pillars with finesse, dodging the sweeping boughs in deft pirouettes and sweeping upward strikes in counter. 

With the boy now out of sight, he cast Igni again up at the Spriggan’s face as it wailed and swung its arms with such force they splintered green trees in their wake. Now with its mantle alight the wailing reached a fever pitch and Kyril squinted in pain at the ear-splitting volume. Dodging another blow he jumped onto the creature’s trunk as it took a knee, and delivered in acceleration a thrust into its neck. The silver-edged blade penetrated with much greater ease than steel, and the creature began to shudder in throes as he held it place.

The boy watched on from behind a fallen tree at his escort and companion, now seeing him for slayer he was. He had never seen a sword wielded that way nor attacks strung together too fast to behold. A killer indeed. 

The creature let out a long and shuddering cry as it breathed its last. A sticky amber liquid oozed from its wounds. There was quiet. 

“Boy” he called. “Boy! Come now, he’s dead”.

He emerged from his hiding place behind a fallen tree, and the duo regarded it for a time in silence. 

“Listen boy”, the witcher turned to him with a grim face, “I am not your father, but until we reach Dun Murra I am responsible for you. You disobeyed me and could have easily been killed. “

He paused as the boy hung his head.

“But you saved my hide just now, and that was some fine shooting,” he said with a wink. “Bring me that ax, and let’s collect our pay.”


End file.
